Template-based framework of TTRPG prep/design.
Last week I wrote about travel as rooms . RECAP To travel : to go from point A to point B. To roam : to search an area, looking for discoveries. If there's no challenge to the journey, just skip/narrate it. To add opportunities to sidetrack or overcome challenges , include short interactable elements :navigational dilemmas or hazards, alluring locales with rewards at a cost, social or hostile…
This post suggests running travel as a ROOM . 1 Please note I'm going for the soggiest framework possible (as opposed to crunchy ). 0. 5 years ago, Dael Kingsmill made a video on the difference between travel and exploration in TTRPGs . I'll reframe it slightly for the purposes of this post: To travel : to go from point A to point B. Even when the exact destination is unknown, PCs know the general…
Playing a traditional TTRPG means having structured conversations. We can apply some conversation analysis ideas 1 . 1. The core loop is a simple turn‑taking exchange: The GM describes the situation. The players react. The GM adjudicates and updates the situation. Each part of the loop calls for a specific type of response, just like a question prompts an answer or a call invites a response. These…
0. I've been reading some of Tamás' dungeons at Eldritch Fields , such as the Underground Station, Long Abandoned . This dungeon has 12 rooms. On average, keys are 25 words (not including the title), or 170 characters each. That's just a little over a tweet 1 . Sean's keys for November & December Dungeon23 were even shorter: ≈10–11 words (≈70 characters) per room. 1. I asked Tamás about this knack…
This is a method of guided brainstorming to come up with sets of rooms 0. For the last two modules I wrote, Sepulchre of the Solar Sultan and Tower of the Telluric Goblin 1 , I combined two methods I've come across recently. This yielded nice medium-size dungeons: small enough to fit a one-shot, but big enough for exploration, interconnectedness and potential missed opportunity. 1. The first half…
0. TIME is a LINE . This is a cognitive metaphor . It shows one of the ways we think of time. There's evidence for this in everyday language: It took me a long time to write this. I'll see you shortly . You've got your life ahead of you. We think of time as a line because we experience events in sequence. 1. A story is a segment. Because we experience events in sequence, when we recall such…
When given one, you'll either have two or none. 0. I find choice overstated. For example, Christian claims: Choice is the foundation of player agency. In the context of a tabletop RPG, choice refers to the myriad options that are presented to the players. Presented by the narrator, it would seem. But presenting a set of options risks players discarding anything not included in it. In fact, there…
0. I've recently moved to episodic campaigns . Each episode involves running a MODULE , either a pre-written one-page dungeon or (usually) something I wrote. I've settled on trifold pamphlets as my standard layout. 1. The trifold pamphlet layout: forces brevity; encourages a DIY/print-it-at-home culture; fits the control panel 1 ideal. The end result is cheap to print (accessible) and, most…
0. Spatially, a dungeon is a set of interconnected rooms. Gameplay-wise, I want the dungeon to feel like a gestalt: a dungeon -challenge that is more than the sum of each room -challenge. 1. I think of two components for DUNGEONs: Static : rooms and their contents. Mostly fixed in space. Usually hard-prepped in order to optimise interaction potential ( toyetic -ness). Running them benefits from…
0. Yes, I'm being flippant. But it's a very minor point: Playing a role is subordinated to the game's meta . 1. The game meta is the reality of the social act of getting together to play a game. We're a group of real people, possibly friends, maybe strangers. We use characters to interact with the fiction. If so inclined, we may embody these characters. This gives us freedom to exercise advanced…